Watch the trailer on YouTube: The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time – Overview Trailer – Nintendo Switch 2
The previews for Nintendo’s Switch 2 remake of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time are in, and the broad verdict from those who got their hands on it is that Link has grown up, learnt to jump and finally been introduced to his own legs. The embargo lifted on 14 October, with IGN, GameSpot, Eurogamer, Nintendo Life and even America’s NPR filing impressions ahead of launch on 5 November.
For anyone who wore a groove into an N64 analogue stick in 1998, the headline change is the one that sounds smallest. Link now has a proper jump button. In the original he hopped off ledges automatically, like a man being nudged off a diving board by an unseen hand. He can sprint, too, the camera finally answers to the right stick, and time no longer stands politely still while you browse the shops in town.
Nintendo has also given the cast a voice. Cutscenes are fully voiced, the dialogue has been expanded, and the old MIDI soundtrack has been swapped for a full symphony orchestra. Eurogamer found the English voice acting a touch grating, which was always a risk when a generation has spent 28 years supplying the voices in its own head. IGN stressed that this isn’t a straight one-to-one rebuild, with some puzzles reworked and the structure nudged about, and reports the whole thing running at 60 frames per second, which will feel positively decadent to anyone who remembers the original’s stately 20. A new quest log called Threads of Time tracks where you’re up to and, usefully in a game that hops between two eras, when a task can actually be finished.
Then there’s the ocarina itself. Hum a learned melody into the Switch 2’s microphone, or play it on a real instrument, and Link plays along on screen. It’s a lovely idea and a potential source of domestic friction, since nobody has yet tested how Saria’s Song goes down hummed repeatedly at 1am through a semi-detached wall. Elsewhere, a new hall of statues commemorating defeated monsters lets you read up on old foes and pick a rematch, the game ties into the Zelda Notes feature in the Nintendo Switch app, and two new Ocarina of Time amiibo arrive in 2027 to unlock in-game masks.
NPR’s reviewer called it the prettiest Zelda he’d ever played after a 90-minute session in New York, while reserving judgement on whether the beauty goes deeper than the textures. That seems a sensible position. Nintendo has sold us Ocarina of Time several times over by now, from GameCube discs to the 2011 3DS remake, and the N64 original is already sitting in the Nintendo Switch Online library. The difference this time is that the changes go beyond a fresh coat of paint.
It arrives exclusively on Switch 2 on 5 November, roughly a fortnight before Grand Theft Auto VI turns up to hoover away everyone’s free time. Nobody has yet confirmed whether the Water Temple is any less of a swine. Some things, we suspect, are eternal.
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